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Jeff Borzello
NEW YORK — On an afternoon when St. John’s completed a regular-season sweep of UConn for the first time in 25 years and inched one step closer to its first outright Big East regular-season title in 40 years, coach Rick Pitino urged caution about the team’s star guard, Kadary Richmond.
Richmond missed practice time this past week but suited up for the No. 10 Red Storm in Sunday’s 89-75 win over the Huskies at Madison Square Garden. He finished with 18 points, three rebounds and four assists but spent long stretches on the bench.
“Kadary Richmond is more injured than any player I’ve coached, right now, and he fights through it,” Pitino said. “He’s got double groin pulls, he’s got problems all over his anatomy. And he played the game and played hard. He killed it. He needs time off, as much as we can give him right now, because he’s really hurting. But he showed up tonight and gave it to us. He was brilliant.”
St. John’s has a two-game lead in the loss column at the top of the Big East standings with three games remaining, and Pitino later added that Richmond might have to sit out a game at some point to help his recovery.
“He should not have played tonight. And we got some problems. Because he’s hurting, big-time,” he said. “I’m not embellishing this at all.”
Richmond, a 6-foot-6 senior from Brooklyn, was the No. 1 player in the transfer portal last spring after leaving Seton Hall. After an up-and-down first couple months of the season, Richmond has emerged as a Big East Player of the Year candidate down the stretch. Over his past nine games, he’s averaging 17.4 points, 7.2 rebounds, 5.6 assists and 2.3 steals.
“Richmond is a fully mature player now,” UConn coach Dan Hurley said. “He’s in his fifth year, plus he prepped at Brewster [Academy]. He’s a grown man out there. They’re getting the most out of him in a year that is make or break for him to make a move to get to the NBA. His maturity level has changed a lot. He’s a much different type of man on the court.”
Despite the injuries, Richmond led the way for St. John’s on Sunday in what Pitino called the team’s “best game of the season.”
The Red Storm hit eight 3s in the first half, scoring 50 points before halftime and entering the break with an 18-point lead. The margin grew as wide as 22 points early in the second half before UConn stormed back. The Huskies had the ball down just nine, but turned it over and Richmond responded with back-to-back baskets and UConn didn’t get within single digits again.
St. John’s had five players in double figures, with Zuby Ejiofor (18 points, nine rebounds, six assists) and Deivon Smith (12 points, seven rebounds, eight assists) the headliners alongside Richmond.
“I think we can win every game,” Smith said. “It’s a super special team. We’re making history almost every game.”
The Red Storm’s identity all season has been their defense and offensive rebounding, and that was the case again against UConn. They had 24 points off 18 UConn turnovers and scored 23 second-chance points. But it was the first-half 3-point shooting that gave St. John’s its early lead.
St. John’s entered Sunday as the worst 3-point shooting team in the Big East, ranking near the bottom of Division I in 3-point percentage. But the Red Storm went 8-for-16 from behind the arc in the first half.
“If they shoot the ball like that from the perimeter, they’re going to be a problem for anyone,” Hurley said.
“They have a championship-level defense. I think they have championship-level offensive rebounding,” he added. “How their season goes from here is going to, in large part, come down to making enough shots from the perimeter.”